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By
WADE GOSSETT
Take Quincy, add several
more recent police procedurals such as CSI and Law
& Order, sprinkle the grittiness of an American
city with a bit of British sensibility, and set in
the Canadian city of Vancouver. That's Da Vinci's
Inquest in a nutshell, which describes it but does
not do it justice.
This is a terrific show, with top-notch
performances from Canadian actors we do not see
often enough, and excellent production values and
camera work. And then there's the crisp writing,
mingling mysteries with Dominic Da Vinci's
(Nicholas Campbell) dysfunctional personal life --
here's a an ex-cop and current coroner who's
driven by his work, but has to deal with an
ex-wife who works with him and is having an affair
with his boss. And did I mention he's an alcoholic
who struggling, not always successfully, with a
12-step program?
Season 1, which debuted in 1998, starts with a
4-part pilot that introduces the characters while
they're looking for a serial killer who uses booze
as his weapon of choice. The story takes
unpredictable twists and turns, which set up the
style of the subsequent episodes. Subplots, such
as the complications of a drug-dealing brother to
one of the detectives who work with Da Vinci,
carry from episode to episode.
Campbell has won several Gemini Awards (Canada's
Emmys) and the series should win many devoted fans
in the US. Extra DVD features include the trailer
and cast filmographies. |
